Introduction

Today I’m on my way to Morocco. The first leg of my trip is from Amsterdam to Paris on Air France’s elusive A 321.

Check-in

There’s something very strange going on with my booking. When I bought the ticket, the flight from Paris to Casablanca was booked on the KLM flight number, although the flight is obviously operated by Air France. Then a few weeks later I received an email from Air France informing me that I’d been downgraded from Premium Econony to regular Economy due to an aircraft change. To me this made no sense, seeing as the ticket confirmation showed that I had booked a regular Economy Class ticket. The only difference, as far as I can tell, was that I was no longer booked on the KL flight number, but the AF one.

Then when I tried to check in for my flights, I received the boarding pass for the leg to Paris, but not to Casablanca. So my first stop when I get to the airport is the check-in desk, where I’m informed that I’m not checked in because I don’t have a ticket number assigned to the booking. I ask the friendly check-in agent how I could have checked in to Paris then, without a ticket, to which she has no answer. So I give her the ticket number assigned to my booking in the Air France app. She does something, and tells me it’s okay.

The KLM Schengen Crown Lounge

The lounge is not very busy, after all it is rather early on a Sunday morning.

Part of the lounge is currently closed. They’re doing repairs on the floor. The other half is decked out in Christmas decorations.

I get myself a coffee and a cinamon roll and park myself by the window until it’s time to head for my gate for boarding.

Boarding

Flights to Paris usually board from either C5 or C7 in Amsterdam, both of which are really unpleasant gates because there’s hardly any room to stand, especially not for a fully booked Airbus A 321.

I arrive at the gate just as the inbound from Paris is pulling onto its stand.

The flight is running late, so the departure time has been moved from 09:30 to 09:45.

When boarding starts, it’s a complete mess. Because of the lack of space in the aisle there is a narrow but very long line of passengers forming even before the first boarding call is made. It also doesn’t help that once boarding starts, the ground crew forget three important pieces of infornation in their boarding announcenent, namely a) which flight the announcement is for, b) what gate it is boarding from, and c) that boarding will be by zones. In short: it’s chaos!

The Cabin

It looks like the upgrade fairy has done her magic because I’m now on 3A. There are five rows of Business Class and the cabin is full. Judging by their bleary-eyed state, I’m guessing most of the passengers are transfers.

Pitch on 3A is good. There also a small cup holder and a hook for a jacket.

Service

The service on the ground starts with the distribution of packaged towels and a bottle of still water.

There are three middle aged gentlemen serving the Business Class cabin. One of them looks just like Hugh Laurie. I keep expecting him to start doing his Dr. House act any moment…

By the time boarding finishes and we push back, we’re running 35 minutes late.

We take off and the first few minutes of the flight are pretty bad. The turbulence is quite strong, but we quickly pass through it.

The Meal

Given that the flight time is only 50 minutes, the meal service is surprisingly extensive.

In addition to the tray, there are also warm bread rolls and croissants from a basket.

Arrival

ATC brings us in for an approach on the northernmost runway at CDG. From there it’s about ten minutes taxi to Terminal 2F, where the Schengen flights arrive. By the time we come to a stop at the gate, we’re running 25 minutes late.

I know have 30 minutes before boarding for the next flight begins from Terminal 2E, Hall L.